Estrogen Profiles of Oriental and Caucasian Women in Hawaii

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Abstract
It has previously been suggested that young women who excrete a low proportion of urinary estrogen as estriol are at high risk for breast cancer. Breast-cancer rates of Oriental women in Hawaii are lower than those of Caucasians but substantially higher than those of Oriental women in Asia. In this study three estrogens were measured in urine of women 15 to 39 years old in Honolulu; 101 study subjects were of Chinese, 132 of Japanese and 129 of Caucasian descent. Caucasians in Hawaii, whose breast cancer rate is high and similar to that of Caucasians on the North American mainland, had estriol ratios similar to those of mainland women. Japanese and Chinese of Hawaii showed estrogen profiles different from those seen in Japan and China and approaching those of Caucasians. The observations support the idea that the urinary estriol ratio of young women is associated inversely with breast-cancer risk. (N Engl J Med 291:1211–1213, 1974)